Motorhome trips through Lithuania

Lithuania is the strictest of the three Baltic states: camping and overnighting outside designated places is prohibited and is actually enforced in the national and regional parks, with fines that can run to several hundred euro. A parked motorhome on an ordinary car park outside protected areas is usually left alone for one night as long as nothing is outside, but in the coastal resorts, around Trakai and on the Curonian Spit that is not an option. The spit is also a national park with an entrance fee at the Alksnynė checkpoint: for a motorhome 20 euro off season and 50 euro from 20 June to 20 August, paid at the barrier or in advance via Unipark. Overnighting there is only possible at the campsites of Nida and Juodkrantė; the village car parks carry a night-time ban.

Elsewhere Lithuania has a good network: campsites and pitches at farms (kaimo turizmas), and in the national parks of Aukštaitija, Dzūkija and Žemaitija designated camping spots (stovyklavietės) run by the forestry service, often free or a few euro, with dry toilet and fire pit and usually a simple access road. Almost every town has a campsite on its edge; Vilnius City Camping is within walking distance of the centre. Fires are only allowed at the built fire pits and are banned nationwide in dry summers.

Practical: motorways are toll-free for vehicles up to 3.5 tonnes; above that a vignette applies. Speed limits for motorhomes up to 3.5 tonnes: 130 on motorways in summer (110 in winter), 90 outside built-up areas, 50 inside; dipped headlights compulsory all year; zero alcohol for drivers with less than two years' licence, otherwise 0.4 per mille. The Via Baltica (E67) is the through axis to Latvia and Estonia; the border with Poland at Kalvarija is open, the borders with Belarus and Kaliningrad are closed to tourists. LPG is widely available, with a dish connector.